Multiple times through out the book Johnny admits that he would like to die, and goes on to describe his frustrations about his lack of ability to do so. He feels pointless, worthless, and disgusting, but later in the book he is content on showing the world what war really is; to let every man who was ever drafted and will ever be drafted know what he is really getting in to.
Hamlet emphasizes “Devoutly to be wished. To die, to sleep. No more-and by a sleep to say we end” (Hamlet). And He means that the scariest part of death is not knowing what exactly it’s going to be like. We shouldn’t let the fear of death go past us but to always have hope.
The belief that people should not have to lie is one which comes up a lot in Proctor’s life. As the story comes to an end, Proctor is ready to face his death and throw away his reputation in front of the town. As the accused prepare for their death, a resonating sound of hope rises from Rebecca Nurse. “Let you fear nothing! Another judgement waits us all.” (Miller 133).
With firefights, life and death situations, and the mourning of their fellow soldiers, Restrepo showed that when it comes to war, even when we win, everyone still loses. At war, winning is the main goal. Defeating the opposing side and fighting for your country is what soldiers sign up to do. However, even when the soldiers accomplish their goal, and survive the war, a part of them still dies. They will never be the same person they were before they left for war because what they see, experience and feel will change them no matter how tough they are.
Gilgamesh also continually defends his appearance with the same speech to every important person he meets, worrying so much about how he is perceived instead of what needs to be done. In the Testament there is also a prevailing theme of death, and it is the only true certainty in life. At the end of the Epic when Gilgamesh meets Utnapishtim, Utnapishtim states amongst many things that “there is no permanence,” and continues to emphasize that death is a certainty. The stories have some comparisons, but I feel contrast significantly in tone. In the
The feelings of embarrassment or of shame I have felt. The feelings of shame and fear are feelings which eat one up inside. These men in this war had families, and girlfriends, and friends back home and the thought of not seeing them again is always with them. O’Brien also explains that these men would not let any of these feelings show, “Men killed, and died, because they were embarrassed not to.” (20) They were men, and they wanted to be brave. They had to swallow up their fear and do things they may not have wanted to or were terrified to do.
He hated himself. He had loved Martha more than his men, and as a consequence Lavender was now dead, and this was something he would have to carry like a stone in his stomach for the rest of the war.” Eventually, he came to a revelation, burned her letter purely out of love and care for those under his wings. “He was now determined to perform his duties firmly and without negligence. It wouldn’t help Lavender, he knew that, but from this point on he would comport himself as a
By killing Lennie, George gets rid of a major hazard in his life; even though Lennie would never hurt George, Lennie’s actions would eventually get George into some serious trouble or even killed. The sad truth is that George is forced to shoot the only thing that made him different from the other ranch hands and admit that his dream will never happen. George is now no different than any other workers, Slim tries to comfort him in the end by saying “you hadda George…I swear you hadda” but the sad truth that this book has always alluded to is that one has to give up on one's dreams in order to survive. In the book Of Mice and Men the American dream is simplified to the dreams of two men and this dream eventually seduces two more characters, their dream is to get a little bit of land, own crops and animals and live off of the land. It is a simple dream, one of self reliance.
Tom also wanted to leave once because he killed a police officer and didn’t want his family to get in trouble. “Thinks all the trouble is aimed right smack at her. If I’m gonna get her upset like that I oughta go ‘long.”(Steinbeck 539). Having a place to call home was also important to the family. They learned to not take a roof over their head for granted because they often had to sleep in a tent.
Finally, he chose to go to the war, he said “I would go to the war—I would kill and maybe die—because I was embarrassed not to.” His conscience took over his intellect; he chose to fight, to take over his duty. Maybe he would lose his life because of this, but he wanted to complete his honour and